2. Configure Game Input

Action Mappings are useful to think of as "yes or no" inputs, like the buttons on a mouse or joystick. They report when they are pressed, released, double-clicked, or held down for a short time. Discrete actions like jumping, shooting, or interacting with objects are good candidates for this type of mapping.

Axis Mappings are continuous - think of them as "how much" inputs, like the stick on a joystick, or the position of a mouse cursor. They report their value every frame, even if they're not moving. Things with magnitude or direction, such as walking, looking around, and steering a vehicle are usually handled this way.

While input mappings can be defined directly in code, the usual method is to define them in the Unreal Engine editor, so that's how we'll do it in this tutorial.

In the Unreal Engine editor, under the Edit dropdown menu, we'll click the Project Settings option.

From there, we'll select the Input option from the Engine section on the left. We can then expand the Bindings category that appears on the right, and add one Action Mapping and two Axis Mappings.

The plus sign next to the Action Mapping or Axis Mapping section headings will add a new mapping. The expander arrow on the left can be used to show or hide our mappings.
To add an additional input to a mapping, click the plus sign next to that mapping. Following are the mappings and inputs we will need. Take note of the negative values for the S and A inputs.

Action Mapping

Grow

Space Bar

Axis Mapping

MoveX

W

1.0

S

-1.0

MoveY

A

-1.0

D

1.0

Now that our input is configured, let's set up a MyPawn in our level. The MyPawn class will appear in our Content Browser, and is ready to be dragged into the Level Editor.

One more step is needed to set up our MyPawn. We'll need to give it a Static Mesh so that we can see it in the game. We can do this by selecting the MyPawn we just created, selecting the component called OurVisibleComponent (Inherited) in the Details Panel, and assigning an asset to it through the dropdown box in the Static Mesh category. For this tutorial, Shape_Cylinder is a good asset to use.

We can now save our level and return to Visual Studio to write code that will make the MyPawn we placed react to the inputs we defined.